Szechuan eggplants

Szechuan eggplants is a great chinese dish, slightly spicy Sichuanese flavoured recipe. The long asian eggplants have a firmer texture and bolder flavour in comparison with the western world “big eggplant”. They don’t lose their shape when cooking, resulting into a firmer bite than normal eggplants and they taste great. Simply add a little cornstarch on them before cooking into the wok in order to make the skin slightly crunchier. This meal usually comes with a touch of grounded pork on it, so go for it if you’d like, but this version is a vegetarian one.
This meal comes just like tapas, in the middle of the table to share, with possibly nice dumplings, sticky rice, some wok cooked dish, etc. or if you prefer… as a main meal on white jasmine rice. The secret in this dish is in the ingredients, which are all sichuanese, of course. You’ll probably need to stop at the asian market to find all those ingredients. Especially important is the sichuanese fermented bean paste (Doubanjiang) which is kind of the highly of the meal.

So let’s get that softly spiced sichuanese dish going!

Szechuan eggplants

Makes 4 side dish size or 2 main meals

Ingredients

4 long asian eggplants cut into thick pieces

1 small onion finely sliced

1-2 hot thai red pepper finely chopped (1 mildly spicy, 2 spicy)

3 tbspof cornstarch (2 tbsp for the eggplants + 1 tbsp for the sauce)

2 tbsp of peanut oil (or vegetable oil)

1 tbsp black bean paste(Doubanjiang)

2 garlic cloves finely chopped

3 cm cube piece of ginger peeled and finely chopped

2 tbsp of dark chinese vinegar(or balsamic vinegar)

2 tbsp of honey(or sugar)

1 tbsp of chinese cooking wine(or sherry)

1 tsp soy sauce

1 tsp of chilli flakes paste

Directions

Cut the eggplant into 3 cm long sticks and add to a plate with salty water and put weight on it for 15 minutes